Fish

Scientists Use CRISPR to Rapidly Identify Endangered Delta Smelt and Its Look-Alikes

The gene-editing technology CRISPR has been used for a variety of agricultural and public health purposes — from growing disease-resistant crops to, more recently, a diagnostic test for the virus that causes COVID-19.

In a remote section of campus west of Highway 113, Matthew Stone and a few students are looking after the well-being of thousands of fish at the UC Davis Center for Aquatic Biology and Aquaculture. Stone is the assistant facilities manager at CABA.

“We have quite a large number of fish that we’re trying to take care of and they all have different needs that we need to address,” he said. “These are things we simply cannot skip over during a time like this.”

Inside the world’s first caviar farm that uses fish waste to grow vegetables

On a farm just outside of Sacramento, hundreds of prehistoric-looking fish swim around in 50-foot diameter tanks. These are white sturgeon, the largest freshwater fish in North America. They’ve been around since dinosaurs, can grow more than 7 feet long and lay hundreds of thousands of eggs at a time. The roe of these sturgeon are harvested for a boutique food producer regally named Tsar Nicoulai Caviar.

Walleye, an iconic native fish species in Wisconsin, the upper Midwest and Canada, are in decline in northern Wisconsin lakes, according to a study published this week in the Canadian Journal of Fisheries and Aquatic Species.

Some polar fish can cope with warming or ocean acidification, but not both together.
Some Antarctic fish living in the planet’s coldest waters are able to cope with the stress of rising carbon dioxide levels in the ocean. They can even tolerate slightly warmer waters.

Spring-fed waters a critical habitat for cold-water fish
Rainbow trout like their water cold. As the climate changes and temperatures rise, cold-water fish species such as trout and salmon don’t fare well in waterways that run low and warm.

“Native fish in California are imperiled throughout the state,” said Carson Jeffres, field and lab director at the UC Davis Center for Watershed Sciences. “During the drought, we saw a dramatic change in the aquatic habitats that were available.”

Seafood is low in fat, high in protein, and a great source of Omega 3 fatty acids, which doctors say can boost brain development and help prevent ailments like depression, arthritis, and heart disease.

Health benefits are one reason people are eating more fish. The United Nations reports that global per capita fish consumption has hit a record high and continues to climb.

Can fisheries sustainably keep up with rising demand? What is “sustainable seafood” anyway?

Thirty-three koi swim in sanitized tanks at the UC Davis Center for Aquatic Biology and Aquaculture (CABA). They are refugees from fires that ravaged hundreds of thousands of acres in Santa Rosa and throughout the wine country, destroying more than 6,000 homes.

“In some cases, the fish were rescued from homes that were completely burned down, so the koi are all that are left,” says CABA Director Linda Deanovic, lifting a tank lid to peer inside at a golden, incandescent koi.